Pneumatic pick off for perforated cards



Nov. 16, 1965 J. RABINOW PNEUMATIC PICK OFF FOR PERFORATED CARDS FiledOct. '7, 1963 ibl Patented Nov. 1S, 1965 3,218,061 PNEUMATIC PHCK OFF FRPERFORATED CARDS `lacob Rabinow, Bethesda, Md., assignor, by mesneassignments, to Control Data Corporation, Minneapolis, Minn., acorporation of Minnesota Filed Oct. 7, 1963, Ser. No. 314,561 2 Claims.(Cl. 271-11) This invention relates to sheet and card handling devices,and particularly to a feeder to extract individual perforated cards froma stack, by the use of a suction system.

Card-feeders have been in extensive commercial use for many years.Pneumatic feeders are successfully used with imperforate sheets, cards,letter mail, etc. HOW- ever, perforated cards, such as the usual 80 or901 column unched cards, have not, to my knowledge been successfully fedfrom a stack by means of a penumatic feeder. If one attempts to use anordinary vacuum suction head to extract a punched card from a stack, thedoubles (two cards picked up simultaneously) difllculty is immediatelyexperienced. The reasons for this, of course, is that conventional headsused in pneumatic feeders are large area contacting devices. Thus, theportions of the second card behind the holes in the rst card becomesdirectly exposed to the suction of the head. As a matter of fact,doubles are often experienced in feeding imperforate, but porous, sheetsthrough which air is drawn by the suction of the pick up head.

Since pneumatic pickup devices present advantages over purely mechanicalpickup devices, I endeavored to develop a pneumatic pickup device whichcan be successfully and satisfactorily used with ordinary punched cards.My first approach was to design a head having a card-confronting surfaceprovided with an arrangement of slots such that they oppose all or partof the imperforate area of the card. In other words, the slot (or hole)pattern would be such as to oppose only the intercolufmn space portion(and/or the card borders). By this means, I would eliminate the cardperforation areas from consideration. Although this can be done, itintroduces a very difficult positioning problem, and will probablyresult in a large percentage of doubles if there is slight misalignmentbetween the head and the cards, owing to leakage through the cardperforations. This same ditllculty is envisioned for all suction headswhich are flush against the card at the time that the card is moved awayfrom the stack (pulled or flexed).

Therefore, I decided upon another approach to the problem of pneumaticfeeding of perforated cards, where the perforations are in randompositions (with respect to the suction head). I positioned the head withits major area spaced from the end card of the stack and found that byusing a comparatively large-area, strong suction in a manner such as toform a low pressure zone in the space between the suction head and theend (top or bottom) card of a stack, I could flex a portion of the cardaway from the stack without similarly flexing the card immediatelybehind it, even though the cards contain the usual data-definingperforations.

In the illustrated embodiment of my invention I have a surface to form atransverse hinge axis about which a portion of the card bends when thatportion is subjected to the above mentioned low pressure zone. When thecard portion flexes (usually very rapidly), it throttles the air intakeof the suction head. Thus, even though there is a very minor pressurereduction behind the flexed or deflected card (owing to the perforationsin the card), it is far too weak to draw the second card of a stacktoward the suction head.

The pneumatic action of my feeder is as follows; the

opening (or openings) of the suction head is positioned in spacedrelationship to the end (or top or bottom card of the stack) and arather large capacity vacuum system is used to generate a comparativelylarge-area, highly energized vacuum zone. Accordingly, a considerablearea of the card (for instance one half of the card) is exposed directlyto the suction so that the area of the holes in the end card is small inComparison to the imperforate area. Accordingly, it is quite simple toprovide the above vacuum zone of a strength sufficient to flex the endcard, a large part of Whose area is exposed to the vacuum, but notsufficiently large to cause the second card to flex because the vacuumacts through only the small holes in the flexed card. Furthermore, ifthe second card begins to move with the end card of the stack, it willmove only a very short distance until atmospheric air seeps between theend card and the card behind it, at which time the suction between cardsis broken while the first card accelerates as it bends toward thesuction head.

Accordingly, an object of my invention is to provide a suction feeder toextract individual perforated flexible cards from a stack by forming alarge area vacuum zone between the face of the end card of a stack and asuction head in a manner such that the end card rapidly bends away fromthe stack and is drawn against the face of the suction head, after whichthe suction head may be moved to completely extract the card from thestack.

Other objects and features of importance will become apparent infollowing the description of the illustrated form of the invention whichis given by way of example only.

FIGURE l is a partially schematic side sectional view showing twoapproximate relative positions of a stack of cards and my suction, andalso diagrammatically showing in perspective the suction source, valvingand drive mechanism for the suction head.

FIGURE 2 is a fragmentary top view taken along the line 2 2 of FIGURE l.

As I have indicated previously, my invention is concerned with apneumatic feeder for perforated cards, for example conventional punchedcards 10 (FIGURE 2) having columns of hole positions, some of which arepunched to define codes. Cards 10 are arranged in a stack within support12 (FIGURE 1) having a comparatively short wall 14 with a transverseround edge 16 at its upper edge. The edge defines a hinge axis for theflexible cards (FIGURE l) as will be described in more detail later. Aconventional pusher 17 can be used to maintain the stack of cards at thefront of support 12 when horizontal (shown), however, pusher 17 is notrequired if the stack of cards is vertical (not shown).

Suction sead 18 has a front surface 20 with one or more openings 22defined by web 23 which prevents thin or highly flexible sheets, cards,etc. from being sucked into the cavity of head 18. Head 18 is mountedfor oscillation on a ported conduit 28 which is connected by conductor32 (FIGURE l) to a vent valve 34. The valve, in turn, is connected tovacuum source 38 by way of conduit 36. Accordingly, the head 18 isexposed to the suction of vacuum source 33.

The head 1, is oscillated by a suitable driver, for example crank 40attached to shaft 42 of motor 44, and connecting rod 46 attached to thecrank pin 47 and to eccentric pin 48 secured to the side wall of head18. Thus, when motor 44 is energized head 18 executes an arcuate,oscillatory motion, much like, if not identical to many prior pneumaticfeeder heads, e.g. as in Patent No. 2,979,329.

As shown in FIGURES l and 2, a conventional takeaway device representedby two pairs of driven rollers 50, 51 and 52, 53 is located to the sidesof surface 26 and head 1S when head 18 is the position shown by dottedlines (FGURE l). The cards are fed into the take away device during theup-stroke of pneumatic head 18. To facilitate sliding the card olfsurface 20, vent valve 3d is actuated in time with the motion of head18, For this purpose I have illustrated a cam 56 on motor shaft l2 whichis engaged by the valve-actuation arm 57. Cam 56 is so designed thatwhen head 13 approaches the position shown in dotted lines in FIGURE 1,valve 34 is operated to vent head 1S and temporarily close off thevacuum source from the head.

Attention is now directed to FIGURE l. When the pneumatic head is in theposition shown in FIGURE 1, vacuum source 33 acting through head I8provides a comparatively large-area Zone 60 of suction which acts on theportion of the end card in the stack which confronts head surface 20.The surface 20 is either entirely spaced (as shown) from the confrontingcard, or is arranged at an angle such that only a very small portion ofthe lower edge of surface 20 contacts the end (which can be top, bottomor side) card in the stack. In the former case (shown) bent edge 16forms a hinge axis about which the upper portion of the end card of thestack ilexes as it is sucked toward and against the face of head 1S.Once the end card begins to bend, it moves closer to the surface 20 ofthe suction head and is, therefore, pulled with greater force towardsurface 20. In practice, the action is very fast so that the upperportion of the end card snaps against surface 20. rIhe second card inthe stack usually does not move perceptibly toward surface 20, and if itdoes move, the motion is exceedingly small because the end card willsoon separate from the second card enough for atmospheric air to getbetween the two cards thereby breaking the suction on the face of thesecond card.

When the portion of the card adheres to surface 20, head 1S begins toOscillate and when the card achieves the position shown in dotted lines(FIGURE 1) the leading edge of the pneumatically held, perforated cardis fed into the take away device which removes the card. Then, head 18returns to the position shown in full lines to attract the upper portionof the new end card of the stack5 It is understood that various changes,modifications and alterations may be made without departing from theprotection of the following claims. For example, my feeder can feed thecards from the end of a stack, and it does not matter whether the end isthe top or bottom or side of a column of cards. In other words, FIGURE 1can be turned 90 or 180 (or any included angle) and my feeder willoperate equally well.

I claim:

1. A feeder to extract and transport individual perforated exible cardsfrom a stack, said `feeder including means to establish a exure axisabout which a first portion of the end card of the stack is bendablewhile the remaining portion of the card remains in the stack, a suctionmember having a card-portion engaging flat surface located at a firstposition laterally spaced from and at an angle to said portion of saidend card, the angular position of said surface being such that the edgeof the surface nearest to said axis establishing means is also nearestto said card, a vacuum source connected with said member and providing alow pressure zone between the face of said card portion and saidsurface, said zone being of a pressure which is low enough with respectto the bending resistance to motion offered by the card including theimperforate area of the card portion and the Flexibility of the materiaiof the card to rapidly move the card portion against said surface bybending about said axis, said card portion acting to throttle saidsuction member as said card portion is sucked against said surface, andthe leakage through the perforations being insufficient to attract thesecond card of the stack to said surface, means for moving said suctionmember with the adhered card from said first position to a secondposition spaced from the rst position thereby causing the suction memberitself to mechanically move said card portion therewith, the directionof movement of said suction member and the length of the path traveledby said suction member being such as to require said suction member toslide the remaining portion of the card over the adjacent card of thestack and out from the stack, and a card taire-away device at saidsecond position for transporting said card to a remote location.

2. The feeder of claim i and valve means synchronized with the movementof said suction member to veut said suction member when said suctionmember is in the region of said second position.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,806,695 9/1957Carlisle 271-11 2,819,073 1/1958 Murray 271-11 2,956,802 10/1960 Huck271-12 FOREIGN PATENTS 906,887 3/1954 Germany.

M. HENSON WOOD, IR., Primary Examiner.

ROBERT B. REEVES, Examiner.

1. A FEEDER TO EXTRACT AND TRANSPORT INDIVIDUAL PERFORATED FLEXIBLECARDS FROM A STACK, SAID FEEDER INCLUDING MEANS TO ESTABLISH A FLEXUREAXIS ABOUT WHICH A FIRST PORTION OF THE END CARD OF THE STACK ISBENDABLE WHILE THE REMAINING PORTION OF THE CARD REMAINS IN THE STACK, ASUCTION MEMBER HAVING A CARD-PORTION ENGAGING FLAT SURFACE LOCATED AT AFIRST POSITION LATERALLY SPACED FROM AND AT AN ANGLE TO SAID PORTION OFSAID END CARD, THE ANGULAR POSITION OF SAID SURFACE BEING SUCH THAT THEEDGE OF THE SURFACE NEAREST TO SAID AXIS ESTABLISHING MEANS IS ALSONEAREST TO SAID CARD, A VACUUM SOURCE CONNECTED WITH SAID MEMBER ANDPROVIDING A LOW PRESSURE ZONE BETWEEN THE FACE OF SAID CARD PORTION ANDSAID SURFACE, SAID ZONE BEING OF A PRESSURE WHICH IS LOW ENOUGH WITHRESPECT TO THE BENDING RESISTANCE TO MOTION OFFERED BY THE CARDINCLUDING THE IMPERFORATE AREA OF THE CARD PORTION AND THE FLEXIBILITYOF THE MATERIAL OF THE CARD OF RAPIDLY MOVE THE CARD PORTION AGAINSTSAID SURFACE BY BENDING ABOUT SAID AXIS, SAID CARD PORTION ACTING TOTHROTTLE SAID SUCTION MEMBER AS SAID CARD PORTION IS SUCKED AGAINST SAIDSURFACE, AND THE LEAKAGE THROUGH THE PERFORATIONS BEING SUFFICIENT TOATTRACT THE SECOND CARD OF THE STACK TO SAID SURFACE, MEANS FOR MOVINGSAID SUCTION MEMBER WITH THE ADHERED CARD FROM SAID FIRST POSITION TO ASECOND POSITION SPACED FROM THE FIRST POSITION THEREBY CAUSING THESUCTION MEMBER ITSELF TO MECHANICALLY MOVE SAID CARD PORTION THEREWITH,THE DIRECTION OF MOVEMENT OF SAID SUCTION MEMBER AND THE LENGTH OF THEPATH TRAVELED BY SAID SUCTION MEMBER BEING SUCH AS TO REQUIRE SAIDSUCTION MEMBER TO SLIDE THE REMAINING PORTION OF THE CARD OVER THEADJACENT CARD OF THE STACK AND OUT FROM THE STACK, AND A CARD TAKE-AWAYDEVICE AT SAID SECOND POSITION FOR TRANSPORTING SAID CARD TO A REMOTELOCATION.